#RollerCoasterDay

-image credit: Knoebels Amusement Resort, Phoenix

For the thrill of it: #RollerCoasterDay

Thrill seekers rejoice—it’s #RollerCoasterDay! Today we celebrate the main attraction of America’s amusement parks, the roller coaster. These kings of the concourse have been exhilarating American adrenaline junkies since the 19th century, when the Mauch Chunk Switchback Railway (in present-day Jim Thorpe, Pa.) starting hurtling paying customers down the mountain.

The Mauch Chunk Switchback was more like a runaway train and less like a modern roller coaster.

Mauch Chunk Switchback Railway

The Mauch Chunk Switchback was more like a runaway train and less like a modern roller coaster. But that didn’t stop it from serving nearly 50 years as a tourist attraction and paving the way for the development of roller coasters in the United States. It inspired LaMarcus Adna Thompson, the father of the American roller coaster, to open the Gravity Pleasure Switchback Railway on Coney Island in 1884, starting the roller coaster revolution in America.

Image credit: Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain

The Golden Ticket

​Maybe it’s because of our connection to the birth of American roller coasters that Pennsylvania coasters are still a draw. For the last 2 years, we have boasted 11 of the top 100 roller coasters in the world (8 wooden and 3 steel coasters). No other state or country had more winners in that time frame. Ohio and Germany were the next closest with 9 and 8, respectively.

For the casual coaster rider, the Golden Tickets are the Oscars of the amusement park industry. The awards are organized by Amusement Today, whose panel of voters from around the world choose the winners. The votes are tallied, and the top 50 steel and top 50 wooden rollercoasters are announced annually in September.

In 2017, Pa. coasters notched 8 rankings in the wooden category and 3 in the steel category.

Oldies but goodies

Pennsylvania amusement parks are unique in the sense that while other parks were tearing down their original wooden coasters to make room for the more modern steel ones, our parks didn’t. Pennsylvania amusement parks embraced their wooden coasters as relics that deliver thrills in a way that can’t be replicated by their contemporary steel counterparts. At nearly 100 years old, Kennywood’s Jack Rabbit is the oldest operating coaster in the top 50. Not bad for a coaster that opened before penicillin was discovered.